Digital Library of Indigenous Science Resources

Digital Library of Indigenous Science Resources

The digital library of Indigenous Science Resources is an online collection of text, video, audio, and image files that focus on the dissemination of the scientific knowledge of Indigenous peoples of North America. The objective in creating this collection is to allow users to gain access to works that were either produced or accepted as valid resources relating to the traditional forms of science of the original inhabitants of the North American continent.

Additions to the collection are approved by board members and elders of the Indigenous Communities. The metadata that is used to catalog these items is created by the people who run the collection’s website and is reviewed by the contributing agencies such as The Tapestry Institute and Snowchange where much of the collection comes from. The website can be searched by using keywords, by selecting subject guides and also by use of an indexing system that produces the various taxonomies used to describe items.

The website is not composed of scanned or digitized items but rather focuses on collecting currently available online information and is indexed in a searchable database. As such one must question whether this is a true digital library or rather a portal. The Resources in the website are valuable in that they provide an alternative viewpoint regarding science and understanding of earth systems. However the sites reliability is directly affected by outside factors such as dead links to websites that are no longer available. Nonetheless, it serves a very unique purpose.